The Five Heroes
by FirebirdS0ul
Summary: Story of the Five Heroes of Maple Story as they try to stop the Black Mage(again). Gaah, I hate summaries. Disclaimer: I do not own Maple Story.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Phew. Spent hours replaying "Phantom's Infiltration". I'll try to update regularly. First ever real fanfic, not a oneshot. Okay then, on with the story!

* * *

"Hey kid!" Someone slapped me heartily on the back as I sat down. "Aran!" I smiled.

"Hey there." she said.

"Do you know the reason we're here?"  
"Yes. That woman over there... " she pointed to a woman with curly brown hair standing with Empress Cygnus. "claims to be the true Empress. She has the Skaia."  
"I believe she's lying. Lying and had the guts to call for a Maple Alliance meeting." Mercedes sat down behind us. "Hey guys. Where's Mir?"  
"Hey Mercedes!" I greeted her cheerily. "Mir's sitting at the top. Apparently, he's too big to fit here. " We laughed. "Everyone... " The brown-haired woman started talking.  
"I know that voice!" Mercedes gasped. "Hilla!" "The necromancer?" I asked. "What's she attempting?"  
"Woah, you lost me." Aran said. "Don't you remember? You fought her army of skeletons. " Mercedes said.  
"Actually, I don't. " Aran said. "Oh I uh... I'm sorry!" Mercedes realized. "It's alright."  
"Shhh, what's she saying?" I asked. "Do you all see? I am the true heir to Ereve." she declared. People started whispering to each other. "Empress Cygnus must be the true Empress!"  
"But the Skaia didn't glow in her hands!"  
"Have we been tricked all this time?"  
"Hilla! " hissed Mercedes. "I'm going to get you for this!" she started to stand when...  
"Hold it." said a male voice. "Wait, what?!" Mercedes gasped.  
"What? Who's that?" I asked.  
"Do me a favour this once and be quiet." she snapped.  
"Aran?"  
"I'm not exactly sure, but..."  
"It's a delightful story," the voice continued. "but I believe you forgot something." Everyone started searching for the person talking.  
"First of all, the bloodline. Empress Aria had no children, only a niece. You, on the other hand, are trying to pass yourself off as something you're not."  
"Who dares question me?" Hilla demanded.  
"Second, you used the Empress's weakness to question her right to rule." the voice ignored Hilla and continued. "Her frailty is proof she is absorbing Shinsoo's power. And finally, you claim to hold the treasure of Ereve? The legendary gem Skaia. A true empress would know that the Skaia you hold is a ruse, a bauble, dressed up to lure the great thief, Phantom out of hiding."  
"What prove do you have of these lies?!" Hilla was getting flustered. "How can we believe...ah!" Hilla gasped as she got blasted by a gust of wind. A man cloaked in white appeared between Empress Cygnus and Hilla.  
"Set aside your prolix tricks. The real Skaia is safe," the person whipped off his cloak. "in the hands of Phantom!"  
"Phantom!" Mercedes cheered.  
"Oh wow." I breathed. A card appeared in Phantom's fingers, and he threw it like a steely. It shattered Hilla's "Skaia" into a million pieces. "Are we going to keep playing this game, Hilla? " Phantom smiled. Then, he started using skills.  
"Quick, surround Hilla!" Mercedes yelled. As Phantom distracted Hilla, everyone surrounded her, preventing her escape.  
"Why don't you show the people your true colours?" Phantom asked, an arrow aimed at Hilla. Where'd he get the bow and arrow?!  
"You think your flashy little show scares me?" Hilla asked angrily. As we watched, the brown haired woman transformed into a woman with blood-red hair and urgh, revealing clothes.  
"Fine, I'll let you keep your child empress for a while longer. But don't think you've won. Maple World is already in his hands." She hit her staff on the ground, and she and her skeleton army dissapeared into thin air, her laugh echoing. "Please can everyone return to their seats?" Nineheart asked. Everyone did as told. A while later, they had an ceremony honouring Phantom for saving the day. Typical. Confetti flew from the sky as he returned the Skaia to Empress Cygnus. He seemed to say something to her, and then he dissapeared in a flurry of cards.


	2. Chapter 2

So I'm gonna pretend Mir can talk. But of course, sometimes they'll need to use telepathy, which when the speeches will be in _italic. _I just realized the disclaimer is in the summary by some weird way. Okay then, enough of explaining. On with the story~

* * *

"Hmph. Typical of him to just disappear like that after a flashy show." Aran commented. People got up and began to leave.

"What are you guys going to do now?" I asked.  
"Train." Aran and Mercedes said at the same time. I laughed.  
"Me too. Shall we train together?"  
"Sure. Good time to test you." Mercedes said. "I know a good spot in Leafre. Let's go." We stood up and proceeded to walk to the small Ereve station when...  
"Oof!" A Knight of Cygnus knocked Aran to the ground.  
"I'm sorry! Excuse me!" he continued running to the Empress.  
"What's up with him?" I asked. I stared after the Knight.  
"It must be important. Let's go!" Mercedes followed after him.  
"Wait up!" Mir yelled.  
"Your Highness! We have located the lost city of Azwan in the Nihal Desert" The Knight said.  
"Is anyone alive in there?" Nineheart asked.  
"No... Hilla, who sold the town to the Black Mage for her powers, turned them all into spirits."  
"Spirits?" Mercedes asked.  
"You mean, like ghosts?!" Mir shrieked  
"Yes." The Knight said.  
"Don't tell me you're afraid!" I teased.  
"I... I... I'm not!"  
"Sure..." I smirked.  
"Heroes," Nineheart said, "would you kindly..."  
"Of course." Aran said, hitching her pole arm onto her shoulder. "That's what we're for!" she smiled confidently.  
"Aran..." Mercedes sighed. "All right, let's be on our way. Azwan needs resucing."  
A few hours later, after transferring flights at Orbis Station, we finally arrived at Ariant, a quaint little town in the Nihal Desert.  
"According to the map the Strategist gave us, it should be this way." Mercedes pointed. "Let's go."  
"Maaaan, it's so hot!" I grumbled.  
"What do you expect? This is a desert after all, Master. Quit grumbling." Mir said. I sighed and trudged after Aran and Mercedes.  
After what seemed like an eternity of crossing the scorching desert, we finally arrived at a place bristling with Knights.  
"Is this Azwan?" I asked one.  
"Yes." he said, turning around. "Do you have permission to enter?...Oh! The Heroes! My apologies, please go in." he bowed. We went in and saw various groups of people preparing for battle.  
"Nineheart said he'll arrive about..." I checked my watch. "an hour later."  
"We have time. We should do some training, to warm up and all." Aran said, cracking her knuckles.  
"Are you sick or something?" Mercedes stared at her. "Why in the Spirits' name should we roast ourselves?"  
"Oh," Aran said after a while. "No pun intended. I meant having a little appetizer fight first before the main dish."  
"It's still too hot anyway." Mercedes said.  
"I'm itching for a good fight!" Aran told her.  
"Be patient." I told her. "You'll get to take down Hilla later."  
"Fine." she stuck her pole arm into the ground and leant against it.  
"Quit it, it hurts!" said a voice from the pole arm. Maha.  
"No." Aran said.  
"You little brat!" they began arguing.  
"Hmm... I wonder why Phantom isn't here." Mercedes said. "This is his hometown."  
"Really?" I asked.  
"Is that why he became a thief in the first place?" Mir asked.  
"Yeah, because of Hilla?" I added.  
"Yes. He told us he escaped and had to steal to keep alive. Eventually, he became who he was." Mercedes answered.  
"Wow. It must have been difficult." I breathed.  
A long long time later, Nineheart finally arrived with an army of Knights, Blaze Wizards, Soul Warriors, Wind Breakers, Night Walkers and Thunder Breakers. Everyone stopped what they were doing to look.  
"Greetings to the Maple Alliance Army." he said. "Today, we have uncovered Azwan, only to find that it is under the control of Hilla, a commander of the Black Wings. So today, we shall take it back from her!"  
"Yeah!" Our army cheered. "Go Maple Alliance! Liberate Azwan!" And with that, we marched into battle.

* * *

-One month later-

I sighed tiredly as I plopped down on the floor.  
"This... is... a... never-ending battle!" I huffed.  
"You're right..." Mercedes said, hands on her hips. "Does Hilla never get tired of this?"  
"That's asking the obvious." Aran said.  
"Ahhhh! I can't stand her!" Mercedes screamed in frustration. "We have already lost so much to her undead army. If this continues..."  
"We'll lose!" Mir said, panicked. "Oh no, oh no, oh no..."  
"Stop it, Mir." I said.  
"Don't add on things!" Aran snapped.

"Give the poor dragon a break, will you?" rang out a light-hearted voice. I turned towards the direction of the voice. A man, of slightly less than twenty years old, was walking over. A dark-blue cap with a scarf of the same colour wound fashionably around obscured most of his light blonde hair. It had a weird bird beak for a bill. He wore white clothes with gold acessories and brown breeches. A dark blue cape with intricate gold patterns completed the ensemble. In one hand, he held a fancy looking cane. He looked at us with smiling amethyst-blue eyes.  
"Phantom. I was wondering when you were going to show up." Mercedes said. "Quite late, aren't you?"  
"It's called fashionably late, my elf queen." Phantom said. "I had my uh, reasons." I noticed how his voice always had that teasing edge to it.  
"Hey, I don't care about your fashion statements whatsoever, you are late and that's that! Do you know how many lives you could have saved?" Aran asked.  
"Calm down. For a person with amnesia, you sure do act a lot like your past self." Phantom said.  
"It's my unique personality. No amount of brain-washing can erase it." Aran said proudly. Then, Phantom looked at Mir and I.  
"You aren't Freud and Afrien, although your auras are the same..." he said, an eyebrow raised.  
"Freud... didn't... survive." Mercedes mumbled. Phantom looked at her.  
"What?!" he asked angrily.  
"Anyway, this is Evan and Mir!" Aran jumped in. "Evan is deemed as Freud's sucessor and Mir is Afrien's so-" I cleared my throat. Aran got the message. "Afrien's sucessor too!"  
"Ah, I see." He offered me his hand and I shook it. "Nice to meet you. Just call me Phantom."  
"Hello." I said.  
"Oh right, Nineheart asked to see you. Come on!" Phantom said. We found Nineheart searching for us as well.  
"Our scouts have found Hilla's hideout..." he began.  
"What are we waiting for? Let's go!" Aran interrupted excitedly.


	3. Chapter 3

I leaped backwards, clucthing at my arm. Blood stained my already red robes even redder.  
"Master!" Mir flew over and blew a cool healing aura on my arm. At least it stopped the bleeding.  
"Look at all of you. All so very weak." Hilla taunted. Aran lunged forward with her pole arm, but Hilla teleported away and she missed. Mercedes quickly took a shot. The arrow finally drew blood from her.  
"Curse you little brats." she snarled. She raised her wand to heal herself. Phantom threw a card and it sliced her wrist. She swore as more blood poured.  
I watched as she cast a spell. Her wounds didn't heal, but she floated, smiling confidently.  
"Come at me." she said.  
"Hi-yah!" Aran dashed towards Hilla, preparing to strike her.  
"Aran, wait!" I yelled. Luckily, Aran got distracted by my warning and she merely clipped Hilla's shoulder. But, instead of Hilla getting injured, Aran's shoulder starting bleeding.  
"What the..." she clapped her hand to her shoulder.  
"I knew it!" I said. "Damage reflect. It's a really barbaric spell where if a person tries to attack the caster, whatever they do to the caster will be inflicted on them. And the caster gets away injury-free."  
"A fight with Hilla wouldn't be a fight if she doesn't cheat." Phantom said plainly.  
"Is there a way to nullify it?" Mercedes asked.  
"I don't know..." I said.  
"You..." I tried to ignore the stream of very good words Aran was using. They were really colourful too.  
"Master, what should we do?" Mir asked.  
"Wait, let me think..." I said. "At this rate, we can't attack her. We can't even touch her. It's hopeless."  
"What?" Mercedes asked. "There must be some way!"  
"I don't know."  
"Freud would know." she mumbled. As if things weren't bad enough, Hilla started taunting us.  
"Shut it you witch!" Phantom yelled. He looked absolutely ready to murder her. A great contrast against his usual cool and calm self.  
"My my, how very rude of you. Weren't you polite to me when you so happily ruined my plan to take over as Empress?" she asked, her voice full of poison.  
"It's called putting on a good show." Phantom actually rolled his eyes.  
"Don't listen to her." Mercedes said. "She's trying to make us attack her."  
"I know that."  
"I am losing my patience." Aran mumbled as Hilla continued taunting. A while later, although Hilla was still taunting and smiling, she didn't seem so confident.  
"What's wrong?" I asked. "Tounge-tied?"  
"Of course not." Hilla said. "I'm getting tired of talking to walls."  
_Mir, trust me!__  
__What?__  
__Do what I tell you to, okay?__  
__O...okay... What are you planning?_

_We have to hurry. No questions._  
"No you're not." I said with a flick of my wrist. "Mir, Illusion!" Mir hesitated for a second, then attacked.  
"She's injured!" I yelled. "Hurry!" Everyone reacted and soon, we took Hilla down. She lay on the floor, coughing out blood.  
"You little brat." she mumbled as she spluttered out more blood. "You're just as smart as your predecessor, aren't you?"  
"You can ponder about that. Rot in hell, Hilla." I raised my wand, and Mir blew a breath of fire. Her body burned away in flames and dark energy.  
The full realization of what just happened hit me and my knees gave way.  
"Evan!"  
"I... I killed a person!" I said in horror.  
"You killed Hilla. She deserved to die." Phantom said.  
"But still..."  
"Look, kid. This is the way the world works. Learn to be a man." Phantom offered his hand and pulled me up.  
"Okay..." I sighed.  
"Are you acting like or are you really like Freud?" Phantom asked, sighing. "I remember the first time he killed someone." he shook his head.  
"I don't know. Come on, let's deliver the news to Nineheart. He must be anxious by now."


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Hi. This is the last chapter you'll probably be seeing in a while. Reason? I just realized how hard it is to actually do a full story :P I'll probably continue this somewhere in the future, when I have a nice plotline and loads of time. Until then, see ya.  
Guest Well, yeah... I'm just ignoring it and thinking they're cheering cuz he's hot. No special feelings or anything. Sorry it took so long to reply, by the way.

* * *

"I'd like to thank you all, for helping us to liberate Azwan!" Empress Cygnus said. Her little speech was met with cheering. I cheered along. Mercedes and Phantom stared at me, but Aran rolled her eyes and copied me. Then, the cheering turned into chanting.  
"Heroes! Heroes! Heroes!" and on and on it went. 3 pairs of anxious eyes met mine.  
"Yes, they were really the greatest heroes!" Empress Cygnus said. Her little pun was met with laughter. "May I have the Heroes to come on stage please?" A couple of Knights pushed us up. We stood smiling awkwardly at the army.  
"Say something..." Aran hissed through her teeth.  
"Well, the truth is, you are all heroes!" Phantom declared, stepping in front. "It would have been an impossible feat without all of you. We thank you a lot. Let's give ourselves a round of applause!" There was more cheering and clapping.  
"Now, although we have won, but we have lost too. We have lost many to Hilla. Let's have a minute of silence for those who fell." Empress Cygnus said.  
After the little celebratory ceremony, we were finally alone.  
"You are one smooth talker." Mercedes said, sighing.  
"It's a natural gift." Phantom chuckled. Aran rolled her eyes. I laughed.  
"So? What shall we do now?" I asked.  
"What were we planning to do before this cropped up?" Aran asked. "Leafre something..."  
"You mean, train at Leafre." Mercedes said. "Are you still itching to fight?"  
"Totally!"  
"Come on!" I grabbed Aran and ran towards the station.  
"If you need to get there, I have a faster way." Phantom said.  
"Correction: If WE need to get there." Aran said. "You have no excuse to not come."  
"Fine fine fine." Phantom said, hands up in defeat. A card appeared and disappeared in his hand. The next instant, a little boat appeared from the sky and he told us to get on. I was awestruck by what was reeling it in. A giant model of the little boat, floating in the clouds.  
"Behold, the Lumiere my friends!" Phantom laughed at our expressions. "My personal home and transport."  
"How the heck did you even steal this?!" Aran asked  
"Not steal. Buy."  
"With money you got from stealing." Mercedes said. Phantom ignored the comment as a man clad in butler clothes ran over.  
"Hello, Gaston." Phantom said. The butler bowed.  
"Master Phantom. You're back." I heard Aran sniggering at the 'Master' part and had to stifle my giggling. Hey, laughter is contagious.  
"Gaston, could you tell Captain Renault to turn towards Leafre please? Oh, and ask the maids to prepare snacks for our guests."  
"Of course."  
"Thank you." Phantom said as the butler ran off. He turned to us.  
"Not impressed." Aran scoffed.  
"Your expression betrays yourself."  
"Whatever."  
"Alright, children. Stop quarreling. Come on." Mercedes said annoyedly.  
We soon reached Leafre and began training. It was so much fun, and it made me think twice about Kill Stealing only existing in games.  
"You KS-er!" I laughed when even Mercedes, the Elf Queen for goodness sake, began copying my language. Several arrows made a beeline for Phantom. He countered them with cards. Then, ignoring the monsters, they began training against each other. I laughed and rolled my eyes.  
"Play nice, children!"  
(Master!) I turned to see a blinding flash of light, and Mir grow bigger.  
"Mir! You grew!" I hugged him. He looked like Afrien now, gold horns, black scales and all, and even had a purple aura glowing around him.  
"Congratulations Mir!" said Mercedes.  
"Mm-hmm." Phantom nodded.  
"Alright!" Aran cheered.  
"Yippee!" Mir whooped. "You better watch your behind Black Mage, 'cause HERE I COME!"


End file.
